History

The subject Organic Chemistry was founded in 1939 at the Pharmaceutical Department of the Faculty of Medicine under the leadership of Dr. Djordje Stefanovic as the first assistant professor of organic chemistry. After his transfer to the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics in Belgrade to the title of full professor of Biochemistry, the course of Organic Chemistry for Pharmacists was taken  by Dr. Aleksandar Damanski, former manager of the Central Military Technical Laboratory. After 1945, both practical and theoretical classes were performed at the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics. Kosovka Kostić, who graduated in chemistry at the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade in 1940, was elected to the title of assistant in early 1947. She was elected an assistant professor in Organic Chemistry in 1952, after which she left the faculty in 1954. Between 1946 and 1948, classes in organic chemistry were held at various locations. The Institute of Organic Chemistry got its own space, for the first time in the fall of 1948, on the third floor of the Pathological Institute in Dr. Subotića Street no. 1. During this period, the Institute of Organic chemistry  also employed: Gordana Bončić-Caričić, a graduate engineer of technology with the title of assistant, as well as a pharmaceutical technician Stanica Ćetković. In the mid 60's, a group of lecturers and researchers was formed, which began and ended its working career at the Institute of Organic Chemistry of the Faculty of Pharmacy. Professor Vladimir Arsenijević was the director of the Institute from 1962 to 1988. Together with his associates, such as prof. dr Lucija Arsenijević, prof. dr Slavka Pavlov and doc. Dr. Milica Bogavac, he researched the chemistry of organometallic compounds, especially by applying the Reformatski reaction in the synthesis of biologically active compounds. Prof. dr Danica Stefanović and prof. Dr. Eugene Klein focused their research work on the chemistry of natural products. Prof. Dr. Nada Vukojević, who dealt with the chemistry of carbohydrates, spent the period from 1992 until her retirement in 1999 at the Department of Organic Chemistry. Slaviša Matić, a graduate chemist who unfortunately passed away in 1983, has been working at the Institute since 1977 as an assistant.

In the period from 1983 to 2018, Dr. Sanda Dilber, Associate Professor at the Department of Organic Chemistry, began and ended her working career. Her field of research is marked by an interdisciplinary character in the synthesis of some beta-hydroxy acids, by the Reformatski reaction, as well as by the subsequent study of the structure-activity relationship of the same compounds.